Flexible electronics, or Flex Circuits, involving the use of flexible printed circuit boards (FPC), represents an innovative technological improvement over conventional printed circuit boards (PCB). These flex circuits are manufactured by mounting electronic devices on flexible plastic substrates, which typically may be polyimide, or a poly(ether-ether-ketone) film (PEEK), or even screen printed silver circuits on polyester. An example of Flexible Printed Circuit Substrate is shown by U.S. Pat. No. 6,858,921 to Kashiwagi. The Kashiwagi FPC claims to feature a high accuracy connecting part that is intended to be attached to the connector, where the connecting part serves to alleviate connection failures “even if a pitch between two adjacent terminals is further reduced.” Other flexible circuit boards are well known in the art.
Flexible printed circuits commonly have one or more connectors located upon each end, with the connector having a plurality of terminals, each of which may be electrically connected to the flexible printed circuit board. Often, a connector is configured to encompass the entire end of the FPC, which may not have the special connector of the type shown in Kashiwagi, and where the connector has an actuator that may be pressed down upon to provide electrical contact between the connector and the terminal. An example of such a connector is shown by U.S. Pat. No. 7,581,983 to Yuan. The Yuan connector further features the ability to receive in its entirety, two different flexible printed circuit substrates.
Although there are many advantages to circuits utilizing this construction and other types of flexible printed circuits, the adaptability of the board to conform to virtually any desired shape, and to be able to bend or flex even during its use, is most significant. These flex circuits are also advantageously used for electrical connections where either the board dimensions or space constraints are dominant factors. The applications may involve dynamic uses, such as for a folding cell phone, or be advantageously used in static applications particularly in tightly assembled electronic packages where electrical connections are required in three axes. Common uses are for notebook PCs, printers, digital camcorders, digital still cameras, camera modules, PDA units, mobile phones, LCD units, CD-ROM drives, DVD-ROM drives, MiniDisc players, and other compact equipment. Flex circuits may also be used to replace conventional wire harnesses that have typically been used in the aerospace industry for aircraft, rockets, and satellites.
In certain applications, mounting of the mating connectors is necessary, so it is common to have an FPC connector fixed to a cradle, but clearances and lead-in on the cradle may introduce forces in the connector during docking of a terminal into the cradle. Also, the user may mishandle the terminal when it is in the cradle, causing severe stress on the connector.
This invention serves to solve this problem by housing the connector on a specially adapted holder, which accommodates rotation and translation incurred at extreme positions.